


late at night (when I think of you)

by Lambcow



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Did she make the right choice leaving him on the Supremacy?, F/M, Fluff, Is the Resistance as good as they try to be?, Like is Kylo Ren her enemy?, Oneshot, Rey just has a lot of things to think about, also featuring, innocent Force connection bedsharing, super pure fluffy handholding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 08:57:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14614668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lambcow/pseuds/Lambcow
Summary: "For some reason that look in his eyes, that feeling she could feel echo inside herself in response to his own self-hatred and regret… it made her hopeful. She has her own demons, after all. Her own fears, regrets. They are the same in so many ways."After Crait, Rey can't help but think about Ben again and again.





	late at night (when I think of you)

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know what this is. I was feeling angsty and confused with my life a few weeks ago and I wrote this as a result. Love it, hate it, I dunno. But I finally edited it, and I feel like I might as well share it.
> 
> So here, have some feelings.

She’s no longer on Jakku and she’s stopped waiting for her family to come back for her, but for some reason, her life still feels like a day in and day out wait for _something_. Because she can’t help but feel like something is on the horizon of her life. But nothing really changes.

It’s been a few weeks since everything had happened on Crait and the Resistance has found a hole in the wall to regroup at on a populated moon somewhere with supplies and possibly recruits. Rey can’t help that it feels like they’re waiting for someone to rescue them. Wasn’t the Resistance supposed to be the one rescuing people?

Maybe she’s the only one who feels that way. Maybe she’s the one who needs rescuing because every day it seems like the people around her see her as something that will save them. All because she has the Force. Because people see what she can do and think maybe she will be their new Luke Skywalker. That she’s some all-powerful being of raw saving ability (as if that was ever what the Jedi were).

And maybe she wants to be that because during the day she tries and tries to be that person for them. To give them hope. They want her when she is that person, and for some reason, that is enough reason for her to pretend. How she wants to be wanted…

(And she doesn’t need them, she has never needed anybody. Not when she grew up alone on Jakku looking out for herself and only herself… but these people, the ones in the Resistance, they want to help people. They have good hearts the way nobody on Jakku could afford to, so for the first time in her life Rey wants more from them, and if that means she has to pretend a little bit, make things easier for them, give them hope, well… she would be a fool not to try)

But, in the night, she often finds her thoughts wander to less optimistic thoughts because isn’t it all pretend? Isn’t all of it an act? She’s no Luke, and not even Luke really was what his reputation was in the end. The legends left behind and told of great people, Rey has found, never really represent reality; they never tell the whole story. She doesn’t want to be this figure of perfection and saving grace the way she knows the stories of Luke Skywalker are when she isn’t perfect or some miracle savior.

And she really isn’t.

She’s not some saint or a leader. She wasn’t raised in a cause as a child. She wasn’t raised at all. She doesn’t have any reason to stay except that the people here… for the first time, maybe, they want her. Her.

And maybe for most of them, it’s only because she has these powers from the legends of Jedi. Maybe they only see her for what she can do for them, the ethos she can add to their Resistance, but that’s something that she can understand. On Jakku, only people who could bring something to contribute to the work there were of any worth. Those who couldn’t contribute died of starvation or the heat or in a fight they shouldn’t have gotten into.

Rey always made sure she was worth something there. But it was always a delicate balance because if you were too good but weren’t strong enough to defend yourself, you would be taken advantage of, made a slave to someone else and in Rey’s mid that is worse than death.

On Jakku, Rey did what she had to in order to stay alive and out of trouble.

She knows hardships.

She knows loneliness.

She knows abandonment.

And maybe that’s why she doesn’t trust anyone until they prove themselves. Because words (like, “I’ll come back”; like, “I promise”) don’t mean anything until you keep them

And very few people have ever kept those words in her life.

It doesn’t take long before her late night, lonely, wandering thoughts turn to _him_ like they always do.

Ben Solo.

Because, for some reason, when it comes to Ben Solo, she can’t help but feel like maybe there’s something there. Something more than the man who the rest of the galaxy looks at reverence borne of fear. Not because she’s delusional about what he is. When she called him a monster, she wasn’t lying or being dramatic. She knows what he is and told him as much. And he didn’t argue because he knows it too. He has always been painfully honest at every point she has spoken to him. That was part of why she feels that he can’t be all bad. Especially not with the look in his eyes when he admitted to being a monster.

He’s haunted by the fact. He knows what he is, but it tortures him. Rey can see that. Can feel it. No true monster holds that much _regret_ about what they are -- the things they did. Or maybe they did, and it was the fact that they kept doing those things regardless that made them even more deplorable.

But for some reason that look in his eyes, that feeling she could feel echo inside herself in response to his own self-hatred and regret… it makes her hopeful. She has her own demons, after all. Her own fears, regrets. They are the same in so many ways. He just has more influence, more power, more _sway_ in the galaxy than she does, so everything he does has a bigger impact than her. Except, now that she’s with the Resistance, maybe she’s not so far from being like that too.

The point is, he makes her feel less alone. Maybe it was only because she has been tethered to him these past weeks, that they are connected in some way by the Force, but he isn’t hostile toward her. In reflecting back, she finds he was actually rather passive most of the times she had been around him. Had he ever really been hostile? Sure, before this _whatever_ it was they had, this _bond,_ things had been a little different. When they had fought in the forest Ben had surely been aggressive. But even at that moment, he hadn’t been hostile. Hadn’t been evil. A monster? Always. But, well, he had offered to teach her, hadn’t he? He had sensed her power and whether she would have admitted it then or not, she does want to learn more… but she can’t, not from him. Because…

 Because what did he gain from teaching her anything?

Except, the answer to that is obvious in her mind despite everything. Because she’s less lonely now that she has him, and she doesn’t know why but she knows this deeply about Ben Solo: that he too is deeply alone too. And for some reason, she helps him feel like he’s not alone either.  

Rey wonders at his nature. When they fought in the forest, he had been a mess. He has never seemed quite as volatile as he had been during that single fight. But, Rey can’t help but think that that’s a part of him, the need to fight those around him as if all other things depend on the worth of his opponent.

And she is worthy in his eyes.

She fought him well in the forest and for whatever reason, whatever she did in that battle against him proved she was worthy of fighting beside him….

She knew that much after he offered her a place by his side. If she had realized his pattern when they fought in the forest she would have known, he saw her worth that day that turned to premature night on Starkiller when she slashed him open and kicked him down.

She had marked him, left an impression he would never be able to get rid of. And instead of wanting her dead for it, he wants her—her strength, her spirit, her _ferocity—_ by his side, and he had offered her everything he had.

And oh… how she had wanted to take his hand. He looked at her like she was the most important person in the galaxy. His eyes told her, whispered the sweet secrets and promises that if she was by his side he would be able to fight his demons. And maybe she felt the same way because he made her feel strong enough to fight her own demons too. She wished she could take his hand.

Except she couldn’t because, despite everything -- the way he made her feel stronger and more like a person, somehow, and not just a tool to be equipped in some plan, some pawn to be moved about in a cause --   Despite it all, he is one of her demons, and she has to fight _him._

Doesn’t she?

And it isn’t even him that she has to fight, but what he stands for. She has to fight the decisions he is making. The decisions he has made.

Like killing his father.

And killing Han Solo.

Because though his father and Han Solo were the same person, it was two separate issues in her mind. Han Solo had been a friend to her, one of the first decent people Rey had met… and it hurt that Ben had killed him because of that. But more than that – because she could deal with angry people killing each other and even killing people she cared about… she had lived enough of her life alone and without help to accept that life was fleeting, and kind faces were never meant to last— but more than any of that, Ben had killed his _father_. And what did it mean for the soul of a man that he would look his father in the eyes and murder him?

But…

Maybe after that night on Ahch-To when Ben told her what he experienced with Luke, maybe after hearing what sources to trust he had dealt with in his most crucial moments, maybe she can start to understand a little bit. Because he was hurt in a moment and in a way at a time in his life when things were fragile, and it defined him. Because after a life of being targeted and mistrusted, one of the few people he thought he could rely on to _give him a chance_ had betrayed him. He was angry. More importantly, he was hurt. He had been rejected by those he loved – those he _trusted_. And yes, he let that change him and maybe he shouldn’t have, and things could have been different if he hadn’t been afraid, or he hadn’t just turned and run, or…

And really Rey doesn’t know the whole story. And maybe it doesn’t completely matter anyway because it is what it is, and Ben made his choices long ago—no changing any of it now.

Besides, it seems that

 maybe Ben Solo doesn’t trust anyone in the same way Rey doesn’t.

Because nobody has earned it and trust is something that _ha_ _s_ to be earned, forged from something important. Sometimes that meant it could be gained quickly if the circumstances were right. And sometimes that meant it took time and grew slowly behind the scenes of the everyday things people went through together.

And so maybe Rey trusts a few people now. After all,

in the Resistance, Leia has given her a place and responsibilities and she has Finn who is a good friend, and he helped to remind her of the good things in this galaxy. And, really, she has something to fight for and a reason to begin trusting the people around her. She has a reason to fight with the Resistance.

Even if her motivation

isn’t the same as everyone else’s.

Because she came from a life too simple to really know the complexities of the war politics. Oppression, violence, a voice not heard? But they have food and homes and clean water and clothes and luxuries and, and, and…

Rey never had any of that, to begin with… if she is honest, she has never even really thought to want all those things, it was better to focus on what she did have on Jakku, what she could control. So, no, Rey isn’t fighting for that.

What Rey wants, now that she had let herself feel this way, finally let herself want _anything_ …

She wants to hold that hand Ben had offered her.

And as she lets herself think it in the quiet of her bunk, it feels so right that it makes it hard to breathe normally as her throat closes with fear. Because what would Finn say? And what would those who looked to her to help them—to _save them_ —what would they see her as then? And it shouldn’t matter what they think because Rey has never lived to please anyone else. Life is about survival and you do what you have to, so Rey refuses to let the shame she feels creeping into her mind take root.

She already went to him once, and so what if she hadn’t told anyone of it? She was unsuccessful in bringing him back anyway. She’s not keeping it from Leia and the Resistance because she’s ashamed of what she did.

Ben Solo is not lost forever.

And it’s not as if Rey’s intentions are to take his offer to rule the galaxy together. She has no reason to feel like these _feelings_ she has make her a traitor.

No, she wants to _hold_ that hand.

She wants to be by his side on simpler terms. Without the sins of the galaxy and all the things that make him the monster he admitted to being. Because who he is, well, it’s tied to the things he had done, but he also isn’t the evilness of his actions.

Maybe what she really wants is for him to stand by her side.

She wishes he could see that the destruction and the death he has been a part of with the First Order and on his own hasn’t made the galaxy a better place.

But, then again, the more she thinks about it all, the more she starts to wonder how maybe the Resistance isn’t perfect either. They kill people too. How many times have they bombed people who didn’t deserve it? And Rey refuses to say that anyone, even those who have fallen victim to horrible circumstances are _innocent_. After the life she’s lived, she’s not inclined to believe that anyone, no matter how little or much they’ve done in their lives is truly innocent of the sins of the universe. Only those too young to defend themselves against evil are innocent in Rey’s eyes; they’re the only ones who have yet to live long enough to be accountable for the impact of their choices.

And sure, the First Order does their deeds in the name of conquering and power where the Resistance claims to do things in the name of freedom, but what really is innocence and justification in a war? It’s all just fighting and masquerading battles and strikes in the name of one perception of the best reality pitted against an alternative position’s ideal for the universe.

And maybe everything seems a little bit less clear when Rey looks at it like that.

And maybe it’s because she’s thinking about him already and imagining the ways she wishes the universe could be… but when the Force connects her to Ben Solo as she’s laying in her bed, staring at the ceiling wondering why things are the way they are, she doesn’t move away. Because what even is this war? And maybe she needs to go talk to the general or Poe or someone who has more passion about it because right now, Rey really can’t see the point of any of it. She just keeps thinking that Ben is not lost, and he may be a monster for killing his father, but beyond that, he’s just stuck on the opposite side than her and why—oh why—does that make him her enemy? Are they even enemies at all? And if they _are,_ do they have to be?

She always knows when he appears by the way the pressure changes and the sounds of the rest of the world shift until she just hears him. Until the only thing left is his breathing and her own in this vacuum of _just them_. When she finally turns her head to look at him his eyes are closed.

_He’s asleep._

He looks different when he’s asleep. Not so haunted. Almost at peace.

Just seeing him next to her soothes something in her and she relaxes further into the bed under her, and she wonders at that because she realizes suddenly that she trusts him, and when did that happen? Except, how could she not trust him? When she had gone to him he had denied his master’s every desire for him to kill her when he had every reason to be justified in doing it, in ending her… but he hadn’t. He had _destroyed_ his _master_ for her. He had chosen her over the man he had served for _years_. And then… then they had fought and protected each other. And Rey thinks about that a lot, honestly. Then of course, there was the fact that he offered her the place next to him. It hadn’t been what she wanted then… but maybe, now, she’s beginning to wonder because really what is one side or the other in a battle that seems so arbitrary to begin with?

He must have sensed the change in the air when she appeared wherever he was because his nose twitches and after another moment his eyes open and Rey is suddenly only inches away from Ben Solo and his gaze, intense despite how his eyes are still cloudy with sleep.

To his credit he doesn’t react much except to glance down her frame briefly, taking in all of her before his gaze meets hers once more.

Rey doesn’t say anything but is suddenly more aware of the fact that he is – once again – shirtless. This time in much closer proximity and she can feel the heat radiating off of him. Maybe she misses the heat of the desert more than she’d admit to anyone because being so close to so much warmth makes her want to be closer, never mind that the source of that warmth is a man she wants in her life in an impossible way.

She takes in a sharp, deep breath, realizing that she had stopped breathing once he caught her watching him. Ben smiles at that, not a big smile, or really anything at all, but his smoldering eyes take on an amused glint and the corner of his lips quirk just slightly. And it’s suddenly a lot and Rey feels like maybe she doesn’t know what’s going on between them anymore.

Rey figures it out at that moment: they’re definitely not enemies. Not really. Not after he offered her a place beside him. Not after they fought side by side, defending each other’s lives. After she went to him on the Supremacy. After she fought Luke for him. After she told him what she’d seen in that cave, told him her insecurities and after he admitted she wasn’t alone and she had offered her hand to him… not after she tried to shoot him on Ahch To and he had let his curiosity take precedence and ask her questions…. Not after he had offered to teach her while they fought, and she had taken his advice on searching for power in the force and she had been able to grasp onto an energy, a wellspring of knowledge that had been so full and so near to her own mind….

Had that been Ben’s knowledge and expertise that day when they fought? Was it him that she had clung to, to find the peace she had gained? The clarity of mind and the flow of powerful strikes she had suddenly been able to perform in order to defeat him and run?

It feels like the truth, especially when she can feel that same clarity and peace now that he’s in front of her again and looking at her the same way he had then.

And really, it makes her wonder if they had ever really been enemies at all, or if he just hadn’t yet proven to her that he had a place in her life.

What place is that, really, though? She had left him when he offered her the spot beside him, so not there. But now, with inches separating them, she definitely feels like this is right. Like they’re supposed to be close to each other like this. It makes her wonder if she really did the right thing leaving him that day… except she has to remember the people she has in the Resistance. Even his _mother_ is here.

Rey feels a pang in her chest at the reminder of being separated from family and wonders fleetingly once again on how he could be that distanced from the people who love him, how there could be that big of a strain on his relationships…

He’s still watching her, but his eyes have left hers and they wander across her face, to her hair, taking in every part of her inch by inch for the few minutes they lay there in silence. And it’s a safe silence, no pressure for either of them to say anything. For once they can just be in the other’s presence and it doesn’t have to be filled with politics or turning the other to the dark or the light. For once it is just him and her.

Rey and Ben.

Just two people in a moment in time together, sharing the air and their energies.

In that moment it’s not enough just to see him so Rey reaches out, tentatively scooting her hand across the bed so it’s closer to his. His eyes immediately follow the movement and she watches his eyes until they flicker back up to meet her gaze. She’s asking him, and his reply comes with a tick in his jaw and the slow feeling of warmth as Ben gently grabs her hand and holds it in his in the space between them.

Ben watches their hands between them, but Rey can’t remove her gaze from his face. Her lips part and she can’t help the smile that creeps onto her lips or the feeling of warmth and belonging that begins to fill her whole being.

She turns her head again so that she’s watching the ceiling like she was before he appeared. Except now he _is_ here. And she’s not alone anymore but sharing this moment with him. And for some reason, that means so much to her because she’s never had anyone to _share_ the moments in her life with before. Not like this. Not the dark moments in the middle of the night where she’s alone with her feelings and thoughts and has to endure as the demons in her life crowd in and tell her what is and isn’t and what to do.

And she did think how he was one of her demons, didn’t she? The thought makes her glance back at him, her eyes filled with mirth because it’s so funny to her now that _he_ is a demon in her life. She finds he’s already watching her and when he sees the look in her eyes he smirks at the corner of his lips and squeezes her hand in his in a meaningful way and now Rey really doesn’t know what they are, but she likes this feeling. She likes being around him.

And they hold each other’s gaze and hands, no words, but so much meaning there until only a few minutes later, Ben is gone, and Rey is left alone in her quarters once again. But she no longer feels alone.

And finally, Rey drifts off to sleep, and there is peace within her like she hasn’t known for a long time.

**Author's Note:**

> Like it? Leave me a kudos and a comment about what you thought or your general feelings after having read it or whatever you want. 
> 
> I don't currently have plans to continue this, but if I write any other one-shots that fall in the same vein as this fic maybe I'll add it on as a second chapter.
> 
> Thanks for reading!
> 
> You can also find me over on my tumblr @reyloismyotpandiamtrash


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